Merck to buy Acceleron for about $11.5B

Merck & Co. has agreed to buy Acceleron Pharma Inc. for $11.5 billion, bolstering the pharmaceutical giant’s rare-disease business.

The deal values Acceleron at $180 a share in cash, the companies said Thursday. The Wall Street Journal on Monday reported that the companies were nearing a deal.

The deal is one of Merck’s biggest and represents a bet on treatments for respiratory and blood diseases that Acceleron specializes in. Acceleron’s crown jewel is an experimental drug for pulmonary arterial hypertension, a disease caused by high pressure in the blood vessels leading from the heart to the lungs.

The companies expect the deal to close in the fourth quarter. MarketWatch